Saving the Chesapeake: The History of a Movement

By: null Andrew S. Ramey

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Synopsis: The decades-long effort to protect one of the nation&’s most important waterways The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States and the site of some of the most significant moments in the nation&’s history. This book provides for the first time a comprehensive story of the effort to save and protect its waters and living resources for future generations. Andrew Ramey describes the enormous task—engaging the states in the Bay&’s watershed and the federal government since 1983—to realize one of the largest, most complex, and most expensive ecosystem restoration projects ever undertaken. He also unfolds a dramatic political narrative, tracing the momentous changes in American environmental politics from the &“green&” heyday of the 1960s and 1970s to the environmental movement&’s collision with the Reagan administration in the 1980s and the movement&’s ultimate triumph over the anti-environmental backlash of the 1990s and early 2000s. Along the way, he clarifies assumptions about the environmental movement, the major parties&’ roles in it, and our society&’s efforts to forge sustainable relationships with the natural world. Saving the Chesapeake reveals how a campaign to rescue this crucial resource altered the course of American environmentalism.